Woodland plans to open franchise stores in Rohtak

Last month, during Jat agitation, when two outlets were looted and burnt in Rohtak, Haryana, footwear and apparel brand Woodland said it will assess the situation before reopening the stores.

The outlets were generating sales around Rs 4-5 crore per annum, the company said.

During the stir, arsonists had first looted and then burnt down two Woodland stores located in Rohtak, which was the epicentre of pro-quota Jat agitation, reported PTI.

"For Rohtak, we will asses (situation) before we take a call on whether to reopen the stores," said Woodland Managing Director, Harkirat Singh. He also described the mayhem in several parts of Haryana during Jat stir as setback.

"It was a setback. We were running both of profitable stores. We would have opened another one, but now we are thinking to whether reopen those two. It was a setback not only for us but for so many other companies," Singh said. "We have close to 25-30 stores in Haryana. Practically in all towns of Haryana and it is not that we are closing those stores, they will keep running”, he added.

He further said the company might look at the possibility of opening its stores on a franchise model.

"These things happen and they are very sad. We all feel there is a lot of market potential there, but when such things take place, we take a step back and we think whether it is really sensible to do it, but of course, one has to see as for the future. Maybe, we will be more careful; probably we open franchise. We have not yet thought of how we will take it up now. We are still kind of what the possibility is. Normally, we open company owned stores everywhere," he said.

The company is yet to decide what to do as it is still pursuing on getting the compensation for the franchisees at loss.